Popular Information: “On March 8, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) conducted a press conference in which he purported to debunk the “book ban hoax.” During the event, DeSantis claimed that Florida schools, under his leadership, were not banning educational materials. Rather, they were simply removing “pornography” from school libraries and classrooms. DeSantis claimed the notion that Florida was involved in book banning was “a nasty hoax because it’s a hoax in service of trying to pollute and sexualize our children.” “Removing clear instances of pornography and sexually explicit materials, often within arms reach of our youngest kids, is not book banning,” Florida Department of Education Commissioner Manny Diaz, Jr. added. But new records, obtained by Popular Information, shows the reality is starkly different. Few of the books removed from Florida school libraries were deemed pornographic or sexually explicit. And many books that did receive that label do not meet the definition of pornography — or anything close — under state or federal law. DeSantis touted data collected by the Florida Department of Education from a survey of 23 school districts that removed books from their libraries. He claimed that “of the 175 books removed across the state…153 (87%) were identified as pornographic, violent, or inappropriate for their grade level.” …Notably, DeSantis did not release the full results of the survey. Florida Freedom to Read, an activist group seeking to combat censorship in Florida schools, obtained the full results of the survey through a public information request. The full results of the survey reveal that DeSantis’ remarks in March were wildly misleading. By lumping together books that were labeled “pornographic, violent, or inappropriate,” and then focusing on books deemed pornographic, DeSantis grossly distorts the percentage of books removed as “pornography.” The survey reveals just 38 books were removed for violating that state’s pornography law, 22% of the total. Most books were banned for being “inappropriate,” which could mean anything. ..” One of the banned books is The Sleeping Beauty, “first published in 1977, an illustrated version of the classic fairy tale. Hyman is the four-time winner of the Caldecott Medal which is awarded by the Association for Library Service to Children to the “most distinguished American picture book for children.”